When Orestes had gone, the Jew remained unmoved. He continued to dabble his finger-tips in the water as one who meditates. Presently he dried them on either sleeve so that he seemed to embrace himself.
Said he, "What instruments we use at need!"
She said, "So you have purchased me, Ahasuerus?"
"Yes, for a hundred and two minae. That is a great sum. You are not as the run of women, though. I think you are worth it."
She did not speak. The sun shone, and birds chaunted merrily to the right hand and to the left. She was considering the beauty of these gardens which seemed to sleep under a dome of hard, polished blue--the beauty of this cloistered Nacumera, wherein so many infamies writhed and contended like a nest of little serpents.
"Do you remember, Melicent, that night at Fomor Beach when you snatched a lantern from my hand? Your hand touched my hand, Melicent."
She answered, "I remember."
"I first of all saw that it was a woman who was aiding Perion to escape. I considered Perion a lucky man, for I had seen the woman's face."
She remained silent.
"I thought of this woman very often. I thought of her even more frequently after I had talked with her at Bellegarde, telling of Perion's captivity.... Melicent," the Jew said, "I make no songs, no protestations, no phrases. My deeds must speak for me. Concede that I have laboured tirelessly." He paused, his gaze lifted, and his lips smiled. His eyes stayed mirthless. "This mad Callistion's hate of you, and of the Demetrios who had abandoned her, was my first stepping-stone. By my advice a tiny wire was fastened very tightly around the fetlock of a certain horse, between the foot and the heel, and the hair was smoothed over this wire. Demetrios rode that horse in his last battle. It stumbled, and our terrible proconsul was thus brought to death. Callistion managed it. Thus I betrayed Demetrios."
Melicent said, "You are too foul for hell to swallow." And Ahasuerus manifested indifference to this imputed fault.
"Thus far I had gone hand-in-hand with an insane Callistion. Now our ways parted. She desired only to be avenged on you, and very crudely. That did not accord with my plan. I fell to bargaining. I purchased with--O rarity of rarities!--a little rational advice and much gold as well. Thus in due season I betrayed Callistion. Well, who forbids it?"
She said:
"God is asleep. Therefore you live, and I--alas!--must live for a while longer."
"Yes, you must live for a while longer--oh, and I, too, must live for a while longer!" the Jew returned. His voice had risen in a curious quavering wail. It was the first time Melicent ever knew him to display any emotion.
But the mood passed, and he said only:
"Who forbids it? In any event, there is a venerable adage concerning the buttering of parsnips. So I content myself with asking you to remember that I have not ever faltered. I shall not falter now. You loathe me. Who forbids it? I have known from the first that you detested me, and I have always considered your verdict to err upon the side of charity. Believe me, you will never loathe Ahasuerus as I do. And yet I coddle this poor knave sometimes--oh, as I do to-day!" he said.
